Ken Jennings's Trivia Almanac (86 page)

MAY 27

1935
T
HE FIRST NATIONAL
minimum wage—a whopping twenty-five cents an hour—is abolished by the Supreme Court, which finds FDR’s National Industrial Recovery Act unconstitutional.

SPARE ANY CHANGE?

Answer these questions about small sums.

1.
Whose trademark hat always had a $1.98 price tag hanging off one side?

2.
What organization has never cashed the $3.76 check it got from the NFL after “winning” a 1985 antitrust lawsuit?

3.
What short story begins, “$1.87. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies”?

4.
Whose life savings had dwindled down to $1.73 by the time he decided to shoot George Wallace in 1972?

5.
On July 12, 1979, the White Sox let fans into a double-header for just

1962
T
HE FIRE DEPARTMENT
of Centralia, Pennsylvania, starts a fire in the town’s garbage dump. Unfortunately, the fire spreads to an abandoned coal mine and proves impossible to extinguish. Today the town is almost abandoned, and surveys predict that the underground fire will burn for another century.

I ME MINE

1.
What animal was used in British coal mines until being phased out in 1986?

2.
Bauxite ore is mined so it can be processed into what metal?

3.
As fans of her 2004 comeback album might know, in what town did Loretta Lynn grow up a “Coal Miner’s Daughter”?

4.
What metal was found in Nevada’s famed Comstock Lode?

5.
What John Sayles coal-mining movie was filmed in Thurmond, West Virginia, not in the title town?

1988
T
HE TINY TOWN
of Hay-on-Wye, on the Welsh-English border, celebrates its first annual literary festival. It’s since grown into one of the world’s largest bookfests—Bill Clinton called it a “Woodstock of the mind”—and turned Hay-on-Wye into a mecca for book lovers, now boasting forty-odd used bookstores for only 1,900 residents.

STACKED

1.
What Arab political party is named for a bookstore that Zaki al-Arsuzi opened in Damascus, Syria, in the 1940s?

2.
What British author wrote
Keep the Aspidistra Flying
about his years working as an assistant at a used bookshop in Hampstead?

3.
In what city would you find Powell’s City of Books, the largest independent bookstore in the United States?

4.
Who ran Dartmouth, England’s, successful Harbour Bookshop from 1951 to 1972 and spent his days avoiding Winnie-the-Pooh fans who came into the store?

5.
What rock anthem includes the immortal lyric “Put me to work in the school bookstore / Check-out counter and I got bored”?

6.
What historic San Francisco bookstore was also America’s first all-paperback bookstore when it set up shop in 1953?

7.
What famous couple—both Romantic authors—first met at William Godwin’s London children’s bookshop in 1812?

8.
Presto, Cadabra, or Kazam—what was the magical original name of the online bookstore that changed its name in 1995 to Amazon.com?

9.
Who carried hundreds of imported books in his Philadelphia shop in the 1730s, the same decade in which he started America’s first lending library?

10.
What poet slammed unscrupulous bookseller Edmund Curll in his 1728 poem “The Dunciad”?

MAY 28

1897
C
ARPENTER AND SOMETIME
cough syrup maker Pearle Wait tries selling a new product made of fruit syrup and gelatin. Dubbed “Jell-O” by his wife, the snack comes in four flavors: strawberry, raspberry, orange, and lemon. All sell poorly.

FRUIT COCKTAIL

What’s traditionally the chief fruit ingredient in…

1.
Tapenade

2.
Black forest cake

3.
A rickey

4.
Guacamole

5.
Tarte tatin

1982
M
R.
T
PITIES
his first fool, as that catchphrase debuts in the blockbuster sequel
Rocky III.

THE III DEGREE

All these people have a big, fat, patrician “III” after their full names.

1.
Who was the first black actor to play Shakespeare’s Othello on film?

2.
What onetime NBA Finals MVP was the last owner of the CBA before its 2001 bankruptcy?

3.
Bono shared
Time
Man of the Year honors with what other man and his wife?

4.
What former governor currently heads the Democratic National Committee?

5.
What future radio star had a number one hit with his novelty number “Disco Duck”?

6.
Who took Barry Goldwater’s seat when the longtime senator retired in 1986?

7.
What regular character did Larry David always voice on
Seinfeld,
even after he left the show?

8.
What rapper’s younger cousin Michael Francis raps under the stage name “Two Five”?

9.
What actor took his name off his directorial debut, 2006’s
Shortcut to Happiness,
which sat on the shelf for a record six years before being released?

10.
Who won Pulitzers for his plays
A Delicate Balance, Seascape,
and
Three Tall Women
?

1998
G
ERI
H
ALLIWELL MISSES
a Spice Girls concert in Oslo. At first the band claims that Ginger Spice is ill, but two days later, Halliwell announces that she has fallen out with the girls and left the band. Mourning preteen girls hold candlelight vigils worldwide.

SPICEWORLD

1.
How many herbs and spices are in the Colonel’s secret recipe, according to KFC ads?

2.
Ninety percent of the world’s true cinnamon comes from what island nation?

3.
What’s the traditional herb in pesto sauce?

4.
Oregano, cloves, or nutmeg—what slightly hallucinogenic spice did Malcolm X use to get high while in prison?

5.
What kind of flower does saffron come from?